Systems and methods for monitoring and servicing appliances are generally known in the art. For example, U.S. Publication No. 2002/00952269 to Natalini, published on Jul. 18, 2002, describes an appliance monitoring system for use with household appliances that includes subsystems for continuously monitoring the operations of one or more appliances and a gateway through which the subsystems communicate with a remote service center that oversees the servicing of the appliances. The subsystem associated with a particular appliance tracks various operating parameters and conditions, such as the total number, type, times, and duration of operating cycles; energy consumption during the cycles; and/or the states of various components such as intake valves, doors, sensors, and so forth, during the operating cycles. The subsystem then analyses the monitored information to determine if the appliance is malfunctioning and/or requires immediate or other attention. If so, the subsystem sends the monitored data and the results of the analysis in the form of an alarm or a warning message to the remote service center to inform the remote service center that the appliance is in need of attention. The remote service center responds to a received alarm or warning condition based on the particular fault or condition and also on a level-of-service contract with the user. For example, if a particular fault or condition is user-correctable, the remote service center may contact the user to correct the particular fault or condition. If the condition requires emergency or non-emergency technician service, the remote service center may arrange for technician service in accordance with any provisions of the level-of-service contract.
By way of still further example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,925,420 to Ito, issued on Aug. 2, 2005, describes a service system for an air conditioner. The service system includes a monitoring center which has a customer database, an operational information database for storing operational information of air conditioners for each customer, and a device information database having device information on the air conditioners related with each customer of the customer database. The monitoring center, upon deciding that there is an anomaly in the operational information of a monitored air conditioner, functions to download to a cellular phone of a service technician, over the Internet, information that serves to describe the anomaly, the customer information, and information for correcting the anomaly.
Yet further, U.S. Pat. No. 6,772,096 to Murkami, issued on Aug. 3, 2004, describes a remote maintenance system in which a service center server, located in a service center, is in communication with a home server, located in a house. The service center server functions to perform maintenance of an appliance and the home server functions to monitor a status of an appliance. More particularly, the home server includes an appliance management unit that acquires a status value of the appliance, a communication unit that receives from the service center server a failure model, which is information defining a method of deriving a decision as to whether the appliance has failed or not from the status value, and a failure deciding unit that decides whether the appliance has failed or not based on the acquired status value and the received failure model using qualitative reasoning. The service center server also includes a failure model updating unit that updates a failure model and sends the updated failure model to the home server via a communication unit.
Still further, U.S. Publication No. 2008/0313007 to Callahan, published on Dec. 18, 2008, describes a system for scheduling an in-home appliance repair service. The system receives input from a user via a client device. The input is used to identify one or more home appliances in need of repair. Data identifying the appliance is then transmitted to a repair scheduling server. The repair scheduling server executes a program which determines a plurality of available repair time slots and transmits a list of choices to the client device for display. The available repair time slots may depend on the type of appliance, the brand of the appliance, the particular model, the user's identity, and/or the geographical location of the appliance. Preferably, time slots are dynamically determined in cooperation with a plurality of service providers. Once the user selects a timeslot, the service is confirmed and scheduled.
Additional publications, such as U.S. Pat. No. 7,340,414 to Roh, issued on Mar. 4, 2008, U.S. Publication No. 2009/0100132 to Ebrom, published on Apr. 16, 2009, U.S. Pat. No. 6,842,721 to Kim, issued on Jan. 11, 2005, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,715,555 to Reber, issued on Feb. 10, 1998, also describe systems that use sensors to monitor and report various conditions that are associated with an appliance.
While the systems and methods described in these exemplary publications, which are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety, generally work for their intended purpose, the subject invention provides improvements thereto which improvements will become apparent from the descriptions that follow.